


you get lighter the more it gets dark

by troiing



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/F, Fluff and Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-07
Updated: 2016-03-07
Packaged: 2018-05-25 09:30:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6189202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/troiing/pseuds/troiing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She’s never seen Shepard cry.  Heard, felt, but never seen.</p><p>It didn’t seem right to turn around.</p>
            </blockquote>





	you get lighter the more it gets dark

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first Shiara/Mass Effect fic I wrote, but it's been on a back burner literally for weeks (months???) now as I tried to get up the nerve to post this angsty, sweet mess. Thanks to 2dshepard over on Tumblr for their help early on with some characterization stuff, and to Charlotte and Angie (LTSiha and featherxquill) for their support and betaing!

Shepard is the only one who enters unannounced, the only one with any right. She owns the Normandy and all its rooms; she owns everything she touches. And there is little privacy between them.

She doesn’t look away from her terminal when the door slides open, or when Shepard's hand brushes her waist. “Commander.” Fondness without invitation is a new language, but one in which she is already fluent. The past few years have taught her many things. “There's so much to do.”

“Yeah. I know.” But her other hand moves too, framing Liara’s hips within the gentle press of her fingers.

Something is wrong, something in her voice, but Liara cannot pinpoint it before the soft friction of their bodies distracts her.

“Shepard,” she murmurs, placing a quelling hand on the commander’s.

“I know,” she repeats in a rough whisper, wanting and unsure. These motions don’t belong to Liara’s commander.

Her arms fold stubbornly around Liara’s waist, and Liara searches the monitors in front of her as if she might find an answer there. In them, she sees only the faintest reflection of movement. No faces, no colors. Her white jacket is a strange, luminescent blur. Shepard is a vague, shifting shadow lowering her face into Liara's neck. Liara could swear she’s afraid to hold on and afraid to let go. Shepard hisses out a breath like a hot knife, pressing her forehead hard into Liara's shoulder. Liara exhales in a rush.

“It’s okay,” she murmurs, not knowing why. The hand that moved to mollify grips; fingers wrapped softly around Shepard’s wrist, she draws her in. Her body arches just a little as she raises the other hand, burying her fingers in Shepard’s hair. Shepard shifts, feeling the unspoken acceptance. “Okay. It’s okay.”

It doesn’t seem right to turn around. Not with the commander’s breast heaving against her back, breath ragged and hot. Why she would fight so hard against her tears is an unfathomable question in Liara’s mind. She draws her in more firmly, gripping Shepard’s elbow, and tilts her head to offer the closest thing to an embrace she can manage.

When the storm in Shepard's body dies, it’s quick: one moment, her fingers are curled hard against Liara’s side, a quiet cry strangled in her throat; the next she’s slipped out of Liara’s grasp, distant and quiet. Only her uneven breathing and the soft hum of the _Normandy_ break the silence in the room.

Liara clasps her hands together, waiting for movement, and the uncertainty stretches on for some time.

“I should go,” Shepard finally says, voice hard, abrading. Sniffles. The pale flash in the monitors suggests she’s wiping her eyes.

Liara twists a little, sliding a hand beneath Shepard’s elbow, eyes dutifully pinned to the sleeping nook at the back of the room. No, no, it doesn’t seem right to look. “Shepard.”

“Liara.”

“Take my bed for a while,” she pleads. She’s learned that saying what she thinks is not always the best thing, even if someone else is thinking it too, so she doesn’t mention that Shepard ought not face the crew now. Instead, she lowers her voice almost to a whisper. “I won’t disturb you.”

Shepard wavers for a moment, uncertain, and then Liara can just see her nod in her periphery. “Okay.”

“Glyph, silence all communications, please. And no visitors.”

_‘Of course, Dr. T’soni.’_

There’s a long span of silence in the room after that, marked in the beginning by Shepard’s weary footsteps and the shift of the bed, then intermittent sniffles and sighs, and then nothing at all. Liara works quietly at her consoles, only half-invested in the work. 

_‘Dr. T’soni, I have - ’_

Liara nearly jumps out of her skin at the sudden interruption. It's not something that would usually surprise her at all, but the tension in the room has left her hopelessly on-edge. Her shock quickly shifts to annoyed uncertainty; she’d promised not to disturb. “ _Glyph!_ ”

“It’s alright.” Shepard’s voice is rough, tired, and startles Liara’s gaze towards the bed. She’s curled on her side, facing the far wall. “You can work.”

There are several long, awkward minutes, but after a while, it seems natural. The flow of information between broker and drone follows its usual quiet patterns. Liara uses Glyph as a springboard for ideas, allowing its literal-minded impartiality to guide her thoughts, or seeks information on operatives and colonies as the questions come to her, and listens when communiques come in. Time passes quickly in this fashion; Liara has always been able to surrender completely to her work, and as the Shadow Broker, it’s that much easier.

Only when Shepard speaks again does she realize how much time has passed. “Liara?” She sounds uncertain, and by her voice, it’s obvious she’s been sleeping.

“Shepard.” When she doesn’t speak again, Liara takes it as an invitation, or perhaps an unspoken need. She  
closes the distance slowly, hesitating a little, and stops at the foot of the bed. “Shepard?”

“Yeah.”

She hasn’t moved. Liara slips out of her jacket, watching Shepard the whole time. At the lack of movement or word, Liara crawls onto the bed, easing up behind Shepard and wrapping an arm around her. She channels a question into the way she kisses her shoulder, then hovers, not quite looking at Shepard but not quite looking away either.

“I’m tired,” Shepard finally murmurs, a sigh escaping at the end of it.

Liara settles down into the bedding, curling an arm underneath the pillow and blindly searching out Shepard’s hand to tangle their fingers together. “I know.”

Another span of silence passes between them. Shepard’s fingers twitch restlessly against Liara’s. “Are we going to make it?” the commander finally asks.

“We’re meant to ask you that question. And you’re meant to say yes.” She’s only half joking. Shepard is the one with the plan, with the restless fervor, with the intensity that drags the rest of them through. Shepard’s the one unwilling to compromise if that compromise means failure, no matter the cost.

“Sometimes it doesn’t feel like a yes,” Shepard says with another sigh, turning a little, leaning into Liara’s body.

Liara props herself up on an elbow again after a moment, searching Shepard’s face thoughtfully as the woman rolls to her back. “If anyone can make it happen,” she finally answers, twisting her hand so their palms touch, “it’s you. I believe in you, Shepard.”

“Thanks.” Shepard’s disinterested tone makes Liara frown.

Something prompts Liara to kiss her. Softly and slowly, just on the edge of her mouth. “I mean it, Shepard,” she murmurs, lingering close.

“Yeah. I believe you.” This time, she sounds more sincere, but doubtful all the same. “Am I decent?” she asks abruptly. “For the crew.”

Drawing away to search Shepard’s face again, Liara offers the woman a small smile. “Yes.” Time and rest have worn away the signs that she’d been crying. If she hadn’t felt the hot tears on her skin and the quaver of her body, she wouldn’t know there had been tears at all. Honestly though, she doesn’t want Shepard in front of the crew now, much less alone in her cabin; she’d rather have her here. “But you could stay.”

Shepard looks at her, really looks at her, for the first time, and the fire behind her eyes seems somehow dim. “You’ve got work to do,” she says.

Shepard has always pushed forward, never shied away, and Liara purses her lips, squeezing Shepard’s hand a little tighter. Perhaps this is the price she'll pay for putting work before romance. She resolves to consider the trade-off seriously. Later. 

“You’ve always been there for me, Shepard,” she says after a span, easing her hold on the woman’s hand. “Even… even when you were gone for two years… it seemed like you came back at just the right time. Just when I needed you most, you were there.”

“Dumb luck,” the commander scoffs.

It cuts, but it’s funny too, in the dark way that all the ironies and lucky breaks of their missions are, in hindsight. Sometimes, if you don’t laugh, all that’s left is to cry. So Liara laughs a little, quietly, sliding her hand down to Shepard’s wrist. “I think we’ve had a lot of dumb luck over the years. But that doesn’t make what we’ve done any less important.” They’re both silent for another moment, and she wills the set of Shepard’s jaw to soften, wills the tension out of her, wills her to relax into the bed and _rest_. Goddess knows she needs it. “You came here for comfort, Shepard. I wish you wouldn’t rush back out there to pretend everything’s okay.”

“It’s not, Liara. It won’t be. God, I’m sick of it.”

In that moment, Liara sees more of Shepard than even the tears had revealed, parts of her that she has kept hidden even when Liara has been wholly within her. Her unconscious barriers at their first melding, when she’d been searching for an answer to the chaotic message of the beacon, had been difficult enough to combat; even now she keeps things locked tightly away in her mind.

And even now, with a galaxy of information at her fingertips, Liara can’t imagine ever trying to breach those parts of the commander’s psyche.

Shepard bares them without hesitation now, and Liara’s heart lurches at the sudden defeatism. There have been times when she herself has believed only because Shepard did; that thought pricks at the back of her mind as her eyes dart to Shepard’s mouth, then back to her eyes again. She finds little other than darkness there.

But Liara has never known darkness to stay.

Maybe that makes her foolish, but she’d rather cling to the stars and be thought of as a child than abandon them for the guise of some venerable matriarch beyond her years. She clings to Shepard now, holding fast to her hand, but allays her own momentary feeling of desperation with quiet hope. She breathes in, long and slow, and sighs the breath out just as slowly, loosing her hold on Shepard’s hand in time with her breaths.

“Then let it be what it is for a while,” she murmurs at last, placatingly. The world will not crumble under a single moment of weakness. In fact, maybe having that moment is for the better. A festering wound is a deadly one, after all. “That’s all I’m saying, Shepard.” It’s for both of them when she strokes Shepard’s wrist with the careful, feather’s touch she has applied to so many artifacts. “Just…be here. Let me be here for you.”

“Liara...”

Shepard’s got a way of saying her name that makes Liara’s heart beat double-time, and although the circumstances are different right now, the outcome is the same. Without thinking, she brushes her fingertips against Shepard’s jaw and leans in to kiss her. There’s no fire in it, but there is warmth, and after a moment, Shepard seems to warm too. The tension in her body diminishes, and Liara withdraws just enough to properly meet her eyes.

“Shepard,” she replies, quiet as a breath, watching Shepard’s eyes studiously.

The commander’s gaze, she finds, is just as attentive, subtle and wondering in its cast. Liara perches there watching as they lay in tableau, close enough to feel the heat of each other’s breath.

Suddenly, Shepard seems very invested in the flesh of Liara’s arm, or the path of her fingers across it when she moves, tracing tender circles against her flesh. When she looks up again, Liara is startled by the change; she can almost feel the fire warming behind her eyes.

For a moment, she wonders if the kiss was wrong, if it all ended too quickly, but that’s another thing to ponder later. For now, she presses her lips to Shepard’s cheek, thumbing the woman’s chin with a ghost of a smile on her lips.

“God, you’ve changed,” Shepard says after a long moment, and Liara arches a brow as she settles down beside her again, chin tilted for a better view of the commander’s face. “But you’re still… perfect,” she finishes, frowning unbelievingly at Liara.

First she’s taken aback by the sincerity of the words, then amusement fills her, bubbling up in her chest until she laughs again. She stifles it, but knows her eyes betray the humor that she won’t allow her voice. “Whatever you say, Shepard,” she concedes. Liara would struggle to find a single perfect thing about herself, but she’ll let Shepard have her way in that just once.

She can feel Shepard’s acceptance, so she capitalizes on it, not even thinking to ask again if she’ll stay. “Glyph… monitor for urgent communiques only, please.”

_‘Yes, Dr. T’soni.’ ___

__Shepard’s gaze is back on the ceiling, but Liara continues to watch her face thoughtfully for another long span, relishing in the quiet paths of Shepard’s fingers against her skin._ _

__“You know,” Shepard finally muses, “I don’t get to cuddle with pretty asari very often.”_ _

__She’s trying hard, too hard, for something that isn’t so heavy, but although Liara feels a moment of hesitation, she relents quickly enough. They hardly enjoy each other enough; how can she blame her? “You’d better not be cuddling with any other asari,” she mutters in a faux bitter tone. She’ll confess she’s jealous for Shepard at best, despite her distance, but she’s fairly certain there aren’t any other asari in the picture - or anyone else, for that matter. And she’s a very good information broker._ _

__“Hm. Not while you’re around,” Shepard mutters, twisting to kiss Liara’s forehead fondly._ _

__“Good.”_ _

__And they return: Liara’s eyes on the commander’s face, her eyes in turn on the ceiling, but unfocused, looking somewhere beyond it, towards the galaxy’s endless sea of stars. Shepard’s breast rises, falls, even and gentle, though her expression is troubled at best. Liara strokes her knuckles softly, then trails her hand up her arm and across her body, stopping with fingers splayed against the soft pulse below Shepard’s ribs._ _

__“I keep thinking,” Shepard says quietly. “After this is over… God.” She pauses, frustrated, and Liara clenches her fingers against Shepard’s body in silent encouragement; it’s all she can think of to do. “I’m tired of fighting. I’m tired of making horrible decisions, of _losing_. I just want to stop, but I don’t think I can. My fate’s sealed with Anderson and Hackett. Supposing I live that long.”_ _

__This time, Liara is somewhat more prepared for the introspection, and she allows the words their moment, shuffling them through her mind to the rhythm of the bulleted _thump-thump_ of Shepard’s heart against her palm. “You will,” she finally says, betraying nothing but confidence._ _

__Shepard scoffs again, this time more gently. “What? Live that long, or stop fighting? Or keep fighting?”_ _

__Liara shakes her head, leaning into Shepard, her hair soft and tickling against her nose. “All of the above,” she says with certainty, a lilt in her voice that makes Shepard close her eyes. Shepard’s pulse quickens beneath her hand, and Liara allows herself a little noise of amusement despite the quiet gravity of the subject. “I’ve learned that there will always be some battle to wage…and if I know you, if there’s fighting to do, you’ll always be in the midst of it. But whatever happens, I believe this cycle will end, Shepard. We’ll stop it. Together.” She inhales deeply, eyes fluttering closed as she sighs the breath out again. “I promise,” she almost whispers._ _

__“I wanna believe you’re right, Liara,” Shepard says quietly. Despite her doubts, her hand lights gently on Liara’s as she traces the commander’s ribs, ending again at her waist._ _

__“I am,” she says with conviction, squeezing Shepard’s side gently. “I know I am. And I’m with you every step of the way,” she adds, turning her attention to Shepard’s face again._ _

__Shepard’s eyelids flicker but she does not open them; her lips twitch and she shifts in the bedding. “Okay,” she says quietly, fisting her hand around Liara’s fingers. “I believe you.”_ _


End file.
